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Why theology is tricky and ministers need seminary training

"[Theology is not] a realm of free search where everyone is free to think whatever he or she wants and where the last resort is simply how one feels about something. The last twenty years of American intellectual life have given rather wide currency to the idea that anyone with a moderate degree of self-confidence is free to pass judgment on what makes sense in almost any area, including theology, without needing much homework. This understanding has been futher fostered by such ideas as the priesthood of all believers, the ministry of the laity, and democracy. Without denying the element of truth to which each of those slogans points, it is our duty to come to terms with the existence of a solid and sizable body of tradition: a host of terms whose precise definition makes a difference, a wealth of experience with ideas whose validity is not strictly correlated with whether they happen to turn me on or not, and a story of both intellectual combat and consensus that challenges our capacity for insight and empathy in the most creative cross-cultural research" (JHY, Preface to Theology, 43).